Funeral

Making Funeral Arrangements

Making funeral arrangements for a family member who died oversees requires obtaining a lot of necessary documents. In order to help bereaved family to organize a funeral we provided few helpful information:

How to register a death?

Obtaining of necessary documents

Transporting the body of the diseased person to Poland

Funeral Arrangements

1. How to register a death?

By law, all deaths occurring in Northern Ireland must be registered no later than five days from when the death occurred (except where the matter has been referred to the Coroner).

Our Registrar’s office is located in Belfast City Hall and is open from 9.30am to 4.30pm Monday to Thursday and 9.30am to 4pm on Fridays. Opening hours may vary during public holidays.

2. Obtaining Necessary Documents

Medical certificate:
You will also need a medical certificate, signed by a doctor, which shows the cause of death. If the death was sudden or the doctor treating the deceased is unavailable, it may be referred to the Coroner.The coroner decides if post mortal examination is necessry. He sends a full report to Registry Office.

a) To obtain death certificate you will will need to provide:

the full name and occupation of the spouse or partner (if the deceased was married, in a civil partnership or widowed)

maiden surname (if the deceased was a woman who was married)

the full names and occupation of the father, or where the parents are not married, the full name and occupation of the mother (if the deceased was a child)

the name and practice address of the deceased doctor.

ID of the deceased

b) Who can register?

any relative of the deceased who has knowledge of the details needed to register

a person present at the death

a person taking care of the funeral arrangements

the executor or administrator of the deceased estate

the governor, matron or chief officer of a public building where the death occurred

a person living in and responsible for a house, lodgings or apartments where the death occurred

a person finding, or taking charge of, the body.

c) What will I receive? Once the death is registered, you will receive:

a GRO 21 form which allows a burial or cremation to take place.

Form 36 (certificate of registration of death) for social security purposes if the deceased received a state pension or benefits.

certificates, which may be needed when sorting out the deceased’s affairs, may be purchased at the time of registration for £8 per copy. You can pay by credit/debit card, cheque or cash.

3. Transporting the ashes or body of the deceased person to Poland

If you want to transport the body of the deceased person to Poland, you need to send the Death certificate to Polish Starosta or Mayer in your home town and request their written permission for the burial of the body in Poland.

Then you need to send the written permission to the Polish Consul in Edinburgh and ask him to provide you with a written permission to transport the body/ ashes of the deceased person from Northern Ireland to Poland.

When you obtain all the necessary clearance documents such as: medical certificate, death certificate and written permissions from the Polish officials regarding transport and burial of the body/ ashes:

you can transport the ashes by yourself complying with the regulations of the airline you are going to use. Each airline has their own procedures,

you need to use funeral directors (Polish or/ and Northern Irish) to transport and to receive the body in Poland.

4. Making Funeral Arrangements

During your first meeting regarding funeral arrangements you would need to provide the documents below: